Tuesday, June 07, 2011

I don't love Explosions in the Sky

Mike Spies's preposterous-on-its-face Slate article, Facebook Music: Why we all Love Explosions in the Sky doesn't pass a basic sniff test. Not only are EITS transparently inferior to things like Sigur Ros or Boards of Canada or Radiohead/Jonny Greenwood's solo stuff, they also don't even make the grade on the stuff they're most known for: Friday Night Lights.

EITS provided most of the music for the original FNL (2004) film, e.g.:

EITS's stuff is just OK in my view - pleasant-ish but definitely generic and forgettable. The TV producers evidently agreed, because when they needed theme music for a FNL weekly show they smartly brought in someone with rather more talent to imitate EITS and improve on their basic formula (i.e., to make something genuinely memorable):

Mission accomplished. This weekly FNL theme is by the great (and wonderfuly named) W.G. Snuffy Walden, who was previously responsible for classic opening credits themes for thirty something and Roseanne (as well as other stuff such as The West Wing's theme that I don't rate as highly). Walden's theme is literally EITS done with real musical flare. That one can love. EITS's tepid noodlings? Not so much.